Validation of the YLS/CMI on an Australian Juvenile Offending Population

Abstract

There is a wealth of research that shows juvenile justice systems that utilize structured and validated assessment tools, such as the YLS/CMI, are far more effective at reducing rates of recidivism than those who do not. In line with this research, the Department of Justice (DoJ) in Western Australia adopted the YLS/CMI as the standard risk assessment tool for evaluating the criminogenic risk and needs of youth entering the justice system. While there is evidence supporting the utility of the YLS/CMI in predicting recidivism, there is little research demonstrating its effectiveness in Australian juvenile populations and no such research in a West Australian population. There is also a lack of research on the utility of the tool with young Indigenous offenders, which is particularly concerning given the significant overrepresentation of Indigenous people in the Australian criminal justice system. Our study was the first to examine the reliability and predictive validity of the YLS/CMI on a sample of West Australian juvenile offenders. In this paper, we present the results of two analyses. The first examines the properties of the YLS/CMI in a cohort of 4,653 juvenile offenders in Western Australia, including factor structure, internal consistency, and differences between male and female youth and between Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth. Consistent with our hypotheses, the tool demonstrated excellent internal consistency (α = .91) and cross-validation analyses identified significant differences between groups on total YLS scores and risk domains. The second analysis examines the predictive validity of the YLS/CMI in a subsample of 921 youth with a minimum follow-up period of 2 years. The overall recidivism rate was 74.8% and there were differences in scores and recidivism rates for Indigenous compared to non-Indigenous youth, although the predictive accuracies in terms of AUC were similar ( c. = 0.65 and 0.66, respectively).

Criminogenic Risk Assessment Beyond Juvenile Justice: Exploring the Predictive Ability of the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI) in Norway

“…The Leisure/Recreation domain has been criticized for having items that have questionable relationship with criminal recidivism, and moreover, subjective scoring criteria that make it difficult to score reliably (Baird et al, 2013). Likewise, substance abuse has been reported to have inconsistent association with criminal recidivism, particularly for females, spanning from a very salient criminogenic domain (Olver et al, 2014) to having no predictive utility (Dellar et al, 2023). In the current study, findings suggest that risk factors affiliated with substance abuse may not be clear-cut “criminogenic needs” that drives criminal behavior within this population, but instead feature distinct clinical needs.…”

The effectiveness of trauma-informed youth justice: a discussion and review

“…Around the western world, a series of reviews, inquiries, and investigations (e.g., Goldson, 2000;Woods and Osho, 2013;Inquiry, 2014;Clancey et al, 2020) have each handed down reports that draw attention to harmful and abusive practice, raising questions about the quality of current services and calling for agencies to articulate a stronger vision to guide their work. In response, youth justice agencies have been encouraged to implement more evidence-informed approaches (e.g., Armytage and Ogloff, 2017), such as differentiated case management based on the Risk Needs Responsivity model (e.g., Brogan et al, 2015), and the adoption of associated assessment tools (e.g., the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory; see Dellar et al, 2023). While this has been shown to improve service outcomes (e.g., Vincent et al, 2021) other approaches, such as the Good Lives Model (presented as more client-centered and strengths-based), have also proven influential (Fortune, 2018).…”